I consider Mr. Narayanan Vaghul my mentor, because he gave me a huge amount of support and confidence, and understood my business model.

Yes, I’m part of the Rolex mentoring programme for the 2023-2024 season, and my mentor, the architect Anne Lacaton, is actually the one who suggested I should do a project here. I explained in my application about how much influence it’s had on me, so she told me we should take advantage of this time together and work on something in my hometown. Her guidance has been so crucial, especially because I have such strong personal ties to the area, she’s been extremely helpful in reminding me of what my role is as an architect.

Well, that all comes from your network. And so even today with, well over 300 million people on LinkedIn, most people have yet to learn how to use their network, in order to ally with their network, in order to find the right economic opportunities. And that’s one of the things that I’m still working on.

I literally just call my five or ten best friends around the world. Sometimes I just go through the list. I call Aly. Ah, no answer. Okay, let me try Mitra. Ah, no answer. Okay, let me try Zita. "Hey, I got an idea. Let me run it by you? Okay? You got a minute?"

I stayed on the path out of fear, not of being eaten by a wolf, but of being cut, being benched, losing my paycheck. If I could go back and tell my younger self one thing it would be this: "Abby, you were never Little Red Riding Hood; you were always the wolf."

My wife has inspired me probably the most out of my person in my life…Mia Hamm had a huge impact on my life – not just as a player. When I was new to the team I watched how she treated her teammates. I watched how she interacted with fans. I watched how she dealt with sponsors and her off the field business decisions. Mia was the symbol of the impossible.

I look back on many parts of my career and none rises to the top of the pride avenue for me more than the way that I responded to the benching in the 2015 Women’s World Cup.

Too often women are told not to be ambitious. Girls are told not to be ambitious, to just fit in, don’t rock the boat, be happy and grateful for what you already have. And it’s like—no, the only way things change is if we start demanding what we deserve.

Without that structure, I ended up feeling overwhelmed.

When you are in love, it's a knowing. It's a knowing like you know your own age, and you know your own family's, like, last name. That's what love feels like.